Chapter 109: Class
Xu Min sighed as he looked into the sky. He was on his way to his first class. As he reached it, he saw a whole colosseum filled with students sitting on stone chairs with stone desks in front of them. They were all looking down at the Immortal who was standing on the stage, waiting for the rest of the students to arrive.
Xu Min was one of the last students to arrive. He found a seat right in the very back where not many sat. Although he was trying his very best not to attract attention, everyone looked at him with curiosity.
While Xu Min entered the classroom, his eyes swept across the many elves. He quickly found that the majority of them were foreigners to him. He had never seen them before, and many of them gave him a sense of pressure. Only now did he understand that the Immortal Mu Zi had been correct when he had said that Xu Min was only average at this academy. Although he had comprehended a domain, he could only be considered ordinary here at the academy.
It was only the weakest experts who had come to the sparring field previously that day. None of the real experts had come to see the battles. It was clear that none of them had taken Xu Min seriously. However, now that he had defeated even the Fiery Fairy they watched him with curiosity. He was not on their level, but he was not weak either.
"Find your seats, everyone," the Immortal said with a hoarse voice. He sounded quite old. Although Immortals did not age, they would remain the way they looked when they became Immortals. They all looked differently. Some were young when they became Immortals while others were older. This man was clearly older when he had become an Immortal. Nevertheless, the man’s age did not decrease the level of respect afforded to him. The older one became, the harder it was to advance. Thus, to see an old immortal, was quite rare but also a show of someone having great discipline and determination.
Such a person, Xu Min felt quite a bit of respect towards. He was silent as he looked at the Immortal at the platform.
As he looked down, he noticed that his eyes locked with the Immortal’s eyes. A small smile was on his face as he looked at Xu Min with curiosity. The moment he saw that Xu Min looked at him he nodded politely before he turned his gaze away.
"It seems that many of these Immortals know about my master," Xu Min mused to himself. There was no reason that an esteemed Immortal such as this one needed to be polite to him. It was clear that it was because of something else and the only thing that Xu Min could think about was his master. "I do wonder what kind of person master Wang Li is?" he sighed.
"Welcome to class," the Immortal spoke up, his voice rang through the entire colosseum as he spoke. Every single student could hear his voice, and no one spoke. Everyone politely waited to hear what was being said.
"Today we have a new student in our class; this student is Xu Min, the first human to enter our academy," the expert calmly explained. Every set of eyes within the colosseum turned to look at Xu Min who was seated in the back.
Many eyes showed hostility, but some showed indifference or even curiosity. It was clear that the stronger ones paid no real attention to Xu Min. He was but a lovely human, someone who had appeared in their academy, but he could not hold a candle to them and their powers. Thus they did not bother with him.
"It seems that I was only up against the weaker ones," Xu Min mocked himself. He understood perfectly well what it meant to be average. He was not of the weaker experts within the academy, but he was not amongst the strongest ones either. He was just neatly placed in the middle, or so he had been before he had comprehended his domain.
Even Mu Zi was unaware of the fact that Xu Min had comprehended a domain; therefore his strength had risen drastically, but he still had a very long way to go before he could be considered one of the stronger individuals within the academy.
"I need to become stronger, I need to get my strength under control and to understand the spiritual energy within me." he mumbled to himself, "the sooner I understand this, the sooner I can return to the Blood Pagoda. When I enter the Blood Pagoda once more, I will be able to gain enough strength to face the Zhong family."
Xu Min's heart was still filled with the need for revenge. Years had gone by after his sister's death, but the flames of rage within his body had not changed. He needed to ensure that his sister was avenged. He would make sure t the ones who had caused her to die would tortuously pay tribute to her memory.
Just thinking about it, Xu Min felt his body heat up in anger. Nevertheless, he closed his eyes for a moment and calmed himself, ensuring that his killing intent did not run wild.
In the classroom, three people looked at Xu Min at that moment. One was the Immortal while the others were two high ranked students. All three of them had confused expressions on their faces and traces of keen interest.
The killing intent had lasted for but a second and had not fully enveloped anyone. However, during these brief moments, it had been so sharp and dreadful that the two students who had noticed it felt a chill run down their spine. This feeling was only felt when they were out on missions and encountered dangerous opponents.
For such a young man to have killing intent like this, just how many people had he murdered? Just how much hostility burned within his body? It was not before now that these two students started to feel that something was not right with this human who had joined them.
The Immortal was the same. Although all of the Immortals within the academy knew who Xu Min's master was, they knew nothing of the life he had led before joining the Immortal Valley Rankings. Many of these Immortals were also unaware of his massacres within the Immortal Valley. They were teachers or guardians of the academy and their campus; they were not able to leave to view the recordings from the Immortal Valley Rankings, nor did they have much interest in it. It was a human competition after all.
Xu Min had his eyes closed, so he was unaware of the fact that three experts had looked at him with interest. When he opened them again, everyone had turned to look at the Immortal on the stage who was slowly pacing forth and back.
"As I said just before, we have a new student in our class. Because of this, we are going to go through the fundamentals of what Spiritual Energy is and how to use it." the Immortal stated. Unhappiness could be heard in the voices of the students as they started to mumble.
The Immortal was not deaf; he heard every single word spoken within his classroom, even the words mumbled by Xu Min earlier. As he heard the words, his eyes grew cold.
"When we get new elves into the class we also go through the basics of the Spiritual Energy. When that happens no one complaints, but now you all want to complain about the fact that a new student needs to know about spiritual energy? How lowly of you!"
"But he is a human!" someone could not help but call out, "it is already very nice of us to allow him to attend our classes. Why do we need to go out of our way to also take care of him?"
"He is a student of this academy! Not just any human." the immortal said impatiently. However, he calmed down and let out a sigh as he looked at the student who had spoken.
Xu Min, who was seated at the far back, also heard the unhappy voices. He was considering if he should tell the Immortal that he, as a matter of fact, knew about the basics of the Spiritual Energy.
He had previously consumed the soul of an elf. Not just his strength and spiritual energy, but also his every memory. If he had not learned about spiritual energy this way, then how would he be able to use the spirit bow the way he could?
"Spiritual energy is not like Qi. Where Qi is located in the dantian; spiritual energy is located in a small orb placed on my forehead. Spiritual Energy is what humans consider magic. It is another kind of energy which allows for another kind of attacks. It is like Qi, but it does not require stances to be activated, nor is it able to merge with the body and increase my physical strength.
"What Spiritual Energy can do is either take the shape of a spirit weapon, each person has their favored spirit weapon, or it can take on any shape or form. Personally, I know of the Devouring World where the Spiritual Energy enters the entire world and starts rotating, forcing the people around me to be dragged into a whirlwind.
"I also know that Spiritual Energy can work as the internal energy of a Qi cultivator, only stronger and more dangerous than what Qi can do, which is why elves are considered the strongest in offense from all the races.
"You know the Devouring World?" The Immortal asked with bated breath. Not just him; everyone present looked at him as if he was a lunatic. There were disbelief and shock in their eyes.
"I know the Devouring World," Xu Min affirmed with a nod of his head. The words caused, even more, disturbance within the classroom. As to why it was such a big deal that he knew the Devouring World, Xu Min did not know.
"I see. Well, you seem to understand Spiritual Energy," the Immortal nodded his head with a surprised expression on his face. "In that case, we will start discussing the two ways of using spiritual energy, as in offense and defense.
"Spiritual Energy is mainly used in offense. We each have a spirit weapon which suits us. It is usually a weapon which allows us to unleash our potential. The majority has swords, but there is also lances, staves, sabers, daggers and so on.
"Apart from weapons, Spiritual Energy can take on any shape or form depending on the wishes of the user. As Xu Min said, humans are fearful of elves because they need to make stances to compete while elves do not need to waste time on a stance but can instantly send out their Spiritual Energy. On the other hand, the external experts of humans can turn out to be our true doom. The weakness of an elf is close combat. We can use our spiritual energy as we please, but if they can come through our attack, our lacking defense will become our downfall.
"This is why we focus on how to use Spiritual Energy as a defense!" the Immortal kept speaking. The more he spoke, the more a smile appeared on Xu Min's face. Was this not teaching Xu Min how to defeat elves? If he knew how the elves would go against external practitioners, then it would be easy for him to take this into account in his future battles.
Xu Min was thinking about this so called heavens ranking that would take place soon. If he could learn how to deal with elves before then, then he would be able to rank higher than otherwise. With a keen expression on his face, he listened to every single word the expert said.